Ubuntu
xserver-xorg-driver-ati package

Ubuntu 9.04 is so slow as to be unuseable on Dell Latitude D600 laptop with ATI Mobility Radeon 9000 graphics chipset

Asked by edintzis

I've recently installed Ubuntu 9.04 on a Dell Latitude D600 laptop with 1GB ram and 40GB hard drive.
The system is crawling. In my browser especially, It takes 10-20 seconds every time I attempt to scroll.
Here is the output from top:

Tasks: 116 total, 2 running, 114 sleeping, 0 stopped, 0 zombie
Cpu(s): 10.9%us, 1.7%sy, 0.0%ni, 87.4%id, 0.0%wa, 0.0%hi, 0.0%si, 0.0%st
Mem: 1026412k total, 411652k used, 614760k free, 15380k buffers
Swap: 1646620k total, 0k used, 1646620k free, 152372k cached

I posted a question on the forum and got one reply telling me to create a swapfile, which I already have.
It was also suggested to install a different video driver. there doesn't seem to be another video driver for
ATA Mobility Radeon 9000 for 32 bit.

I realize this is a very generic question, however I can't belive that Linux is not screaming fast on this box.
Is there something I can do besides return to XP?

Thanks for your help

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Mark Rijckenberg
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Best Mark Rijckenberg (markrijckenberg) said : 		#1

Hi,

You might need to kill the trackerd process which indexes files on your harddisk and maybe also uninstall the package called "tracker".

I also suggest following the instructions below from user crjackson and add those 8 options to /etc/X11/xorg.conf :

https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/xserver-xorg-video-ati/+bug/363238/comments/8

Regards,

Mark

Revision history for this message
edintzis (eric-dintzis) said : 		#2

Couldn't find the tracker process [yet]. But updating my xorg.conf seemed to improve the situation. THANKS!!!

Revision history for this message
edintzis (eric-dintzis) said : 		#3

Thanks Mark Rijckenberg, that solved my question.

Revision history for this message
edintzis (eric-dintzis) said : 		#4

I'm not sure why this is fixed. I updated my linux to the patch containing
this fix and it is just as bad as it was before the fix.
And now the workaround no longer works.

On Mon, Aug 17, 2009 at 12:45 PM, Launchpad Janitor <
<email address hidden>> wrote:

> Bug #363238 status changed in xserver-xorg-video-ati in ubuntu:
>
> Triaged => Fix Released
>
>
>
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/xserver-xorg-video-ati/+bug/363238
> "very poor Xorg performance on various older graphics HW - XAA solves this"
>
> This bug is linked to #72258.
> Ubuntu 9.04 is so slow as to be unuseable on Dell Latitude D600 laptop with
> ATI Mobility Radeon 9000 graphics chipset
>
> https://answers.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/xserver-xorg-driver-ati/+question/72258
>
> --
> You received this question notification because you are a direct
> subscriber of the question.
>

Revision history for this message
edintzis (eric-dintzis) said : 		#5

If this got posted, then I apologize. Setting XAA enables the fix. Works
fine now.

On Sat, Sep 12, 2009 at 7:50 PM, Eric Dintzis <email address hidden>wrote:

>
> I'm not sure why this is fixed. I updated my linux to the patch containing
> this fix and it is just as bad as it was before the fix.
> And now the workaround no longer works.
>
>
> On Mon, Aug 17, 2009 at 12:45 PM, Launchpad Janitor <
> <email address hidden>> wrote:
>
>> Bug #363238 status changed in xserver-xorg-video-ati in ubuntu:
>>
>> Triaged => Fix Released
>>
>>
>>
>> https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/xserver-xorg-video-ati/+bug/363238
>> "very poor Xorg performance on various older graphics HW - XAA solves
>> this"
>>
>> This bug is linked to #72258.
>> Ubuntu 9.04 is so slow as to be unuseable on Dell Latitude D600 laptop
>> with ATI Mobility Radeon 9000 graphics chipset
>>
>> https://answers.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/xserver-xorg-driver-ati/+question/72258
>>
>> --
>> You received this question notification because you are a direct
>> subscriber of the question.
>>
>
>